Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 108165 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 541(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108165 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 541(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
“Where did you get that toothbrush? The razor?” She shakes her head and stutters, “The w-whole bag?”
“Wal-Mart,” he mumbles over his foam-filled mouth.
Frankie’s gaze circumnavigates the room. Jackson’s wearing black combat boots, but a pair of running shoes is by the bed. And he’s wearing different jeans than he wore yesterday. She opens the TV console drawers.
“Why do you have clothes here?”
He spits and wipes his mouth. “Plan B.”
“Jack, I need you to elaborate.” Frankie tightens the sheet around her body. “You killed three men,” she whispers.
“Are you going to run?” He crosses his arms, leaning into the bathroom door threshold.
She glances down at her sheet-clad body as if that’s all the explanation he needs.
“If you fear for your life, that won’t stop you,” he says.
“I …” She shakes her head. “I don’t know if I should fear for my life. You won’t tell me anything.” Her voice escalates. “I just know that you killed three men!”
He flinches.
Tears fill her eyes as she shakes her head. “I just want to go home.”
He retrieves his phone from the nightstand. “I wanted you to go home weeks ago.”
“Fine. You were right.” She bats away her tears. “Is that what you want to hear? I should have gone home when you told me to go home. I’m sorry. Just … let me go home.”
“He’ll kill you, but not before he kills your parents and anyone he thinks is close to you.”
“Why?”
“To protect his family. To seek revenge for what you’ve done to his daughter. But mostly, he’ll do it to get to me.”
Frankie swallows hard. “He doesn’t know I had anything to do with his daughter.”
He shrugs a shoulder. “Let’s hope not.”
“W-why would he want to get to you? Because you killed his men?”
“Because I’m the man who’s going to kill him.”
She continues to shake her head. Jackson could never have anticipated Frankie the way he wasn’t ready for Ryn. But Frankie’s here, and he can’t pretend she doesn’t matter.
“So I can go home,” he adds to justify what he’s done and still has to do.
A deep sadness fills her eyes. “Where’s home?”
Jackson’s blank expression gives nothing away. It’s as if he doesn’t know the answer. “I’m not going to hurt you.” He grazes his knuckles across her cheek.
She closes her eyes.
“Please be here when I return so only the bad people die.”
Frankie winces, but she doesn’t open her eyes. He leaves her with a kiss on the crown of her head and a click of the door behind him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
FRANCESCA
If you want to know someone, ask what music they like. Music is a fingerprint on one’s soul. Eighty-eight keys are infinitely more revealing than twenty-six letters.
I don’t know much about Jack that can be put into words. But I’ve heard him play the piano, so I know what touches his soul.
That fingerprint keeps me in this motel room despite three dead men. Wearing his tee from the console drawer, I inspect every item of clothing in the room, every essential in his toiletry bag, and every nook and cranny that might hold a clue.
He didn’t rent this room last night. He’s had this space. A safe house?
I look for my purse and phone, but neither is in the room. Maybe they’re in his car. Did I have my purse when Archer pulled me off the Ferris wheel?
Eloise.
Oh god …
She’ll be worried about me, especially if she discovers Jack is missing too.
I startle when Jack opens the door. He doesn’t say anything. Bags in one hand and a gun in the other, he checks the room, behind the curtains and the bathroom. Then he holsters his gun.
He has a gun and a holster.
I have pepper spray.
“Where’s my purse?”
“Back of my car.”
“And my phone?”
He shrugs, setting the bags on the bed. “I disposed of it.”
“Why?”
“Because he has your number.” Jack slides a black backpack off his shoulder and retrieves his laptop. “Which means he can track you.”
“Eloise will be worried sick. And she’ll call my parents.” I pull the clothes out of the sack.
“I took care of it.” He sits on the bed and opens his laptop.
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve talked with her and said you were with me for a few days.”
“You went to her house?”
He shakes his head. “Stopped by the senior center where she walks when it’s hot.”
I hold up the thong underwear he bought me. “I don’t wear these.”
“Fine.” He shrugs, focusing on his computer.
“I like a bikini cut.” I inspect the rest of the clothes. There’s a small shirt, an oversized shirt, two extra small white tank tops, size two shorts, size six jeans, and a frumpy, medium prairie dress in stunning shades of mustard yellow and shit brown. “No bras?”
Jack smirks. “Is that a trick question? I know your nipples have an aversion to bras.”
I frown before shrugging off his shirt. Jack eyes me while I don the dress.